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Archive for May, 2010

Unoccupied building insurance – retail

Sunday, May 30th, 2010

Although we have seen a change of government in 2010 in the UK, we are still, in many areas, suffering from the effects of the worldwide recession and certain actions of local authorities.

Over the past fifteen years, local authority planners appear to have chosen a deliberate path of approving every single out of town shopping centre or supermarket application that fell anywhere near their desks. Of course they never thought about the ultimate consequences which are, in many places, small high streets full of empty shops.

Hopefully things will change and some form of regeneration programme will be undertaken to make more use of these high street premises. We are finding many are being re-let as office premises, lets hope the trend continues.

As a result of these empty locations, there are many more landlords looking for unoccupied building insurance. Insurers do not and never will, like to insure unoccupied commercial building insurance policies.

As a property owner, you may think it is the best risk in the world because it is empty. But, an insurers sees things differently based on their past insurance. Empty buildings unfortunately attract trouble, whether this is smashed windows or people breaking in to steal all the copper pipes, whichever way you look at it, there are few insurers that actually, long term, make money from theses policies.

As a result, you may find the insurer that was quite cheap to insure your building one year, is looking for a sky high increase the next. If this does happen, then do not sit back and accept whatever your broker tells you that no-one else wants to underwrite the cover. If you have had an unreasonable increase and the risk is claims free, then you need to appoint a different business insurance broker to scour the market on your behalf. Whilst we do not offer guarantees, we can be fairly certain that you will get a better price for comparable cover.

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Commercial insurance explained

Saturday, May 29th, 2010

If we were to put up a blog entry that really did explain everything you needed to know about commercial insurance, you would still be reading this at Christmas.

Commercial or business insurance is purely and simply, cover that any form of commercial venture (including a charity), will require. This can also extend to commercial building insurance as the building is not owned for personal, residential use.

Instead of reading through reams and reams of paper work, there is a much easier, and free, way to understand more about what can be a confusing subject.

Throughout the UK, there are thousands of individual, independent, business insurance brokers. To be able to trade, they have to achieve certain financial, compliance and training standards and as a result they will be authorised and regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Without this approval, they simply cannot trade. So, they make sure that they offer good, quality advice because, if they didn’t, it would cause problems later on if they lost their approval, or licence, to trade.

So, if you are loking for a commercial insurance quote or are confused about an exisitng policy, speak to a broker. The good thing is, brokers such as businessinsure will give you advice, whether you are a customer or not.

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Salon insurance – treatment cover

Friday, May 28th, 2010

If you own a salon, hairdressing business or barbers, you need to ensure that your hairdressers insurance policy includes an important element of cover.

Most commercial insurance companies will offer cover, or quotes, based on a standard shop insurance contract. There are certain changes and alterations to the cover, that they will make, to provide the protection that a salon would more usually require.

Under the package policy, you will get public liability insurance cover, this is better explained as third party liability insurance. If you injure, cause illness or damage any third party property or person, you will need public liability insurance. As far as a hairdresser is concerned, this can cover three areas.

Firstly, through the products you supply. Secondly if someone slips, trips or falls (for example) and thirdly, if you cause injury through application or treatment to scalps or skin.

This last part is excluded from the standard shop policy we mentioned above. What happens is that this cover is extended or expanded to cover hairdressers treatment insurance. Most insurers will provide cover for a fixed limit any one claim. Usual limits are £50,000 or £100,000 any one claim. It is very, very rare that claims exceed £15,000, but you never know. Half of the cost of the claims usually fall to the solicitor that is appointed by the claimant. The potential costs are not affected by inflation, particularly where a solicitor is involved.

You need to make sure that your cover is as wide as possible, to prevent the business losing out. As usual, you should speak to a business insurance broker as they are independent experts who will search and scour the market for you.

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Vets surgery insurance – work away cover

Thursday, May 27th, 2010

Most vet surgery insurance policies are based on a different contract. UK commercial insurance companies have different contracts for different trades and types of business. The essential elements are the same but there are certain small alterations to the contract or cover which are, in the insurers opinion, suited to the particular business.

Believe it or not, in the UK vets, doctors and dentists policies are based on an office insurance policy. There are similarities to the cover, except in the fact that most doctors and vets do undertake work away. Whilst doctors can of course get injured whilst doing a home visit, a vet is more likely to be injured because they are dealing with sick, frightened and very jumpy animals.

You need to ensure that your policy does cover you for work that is undertaken at third party premises, in the main this will be farm properties, but vets can, and do, get called out for home visits more often than you would think. The two parts of cover to think about are the public liability and employers liability.

Both of these need to note specifically that there could be a potential claim whilst at a third party location. A vet being injured will fall under the employers liability section. Some insurers, whilst they do offer surgeries insurance, need to be told specifically to amend the policy to cover work away. With a commercial insurance policy you should never assume that the cover is in place. Deal through an insurance broker and get them to confirm in writing that you have this, vital, cover in place.

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Small business insurance – goods in transit cover

Wednesday, May 26th, 2010

If you have ever started a business from scratch, or are running a business, you will know that the range and type of tasks you undertake are never-ending. If you used to work for a larger company, everything seemed to be taken care of. You always had someone you could ask, or go through a procurement process to order whatever product or service you wanted.

However, you realise there is more to life and decide to go on your own. Having done this personally, there is nothing more liberating and it is worthwhile to be your own boss.

One of the many things you will need to do at the start, is to get yourself a small business insurance quote, if you are happy with this, it will then progress into a policy that will provide vital protection for your business.

Going back to all of the tasks that you undertake, one of these will be collection and delivery of stock and products you have supplied or manufactured. As you start and grow, it is unlikely that you will use a third party courier to do this for you. So, you will use your own car or van. If any of your stock is stolen or the vehicle is involved in an accident and the stock is damaged, then you will be out of pocket.

This is where you need to make sure that the business insurance policy that you get, includes cover for goods in transit. Many policies do, with a standard limit of £2,000, which can of course be increased if required.

The good thing is, that you do not need to specify the vehicle or the registration. As long as the vehicle is one that is used by employees, partners, owners or directors, then you will be covered. Watch out for the excess, anything more than £250 is too high and also check any terms regarding losses in unattended vehicles overnight.

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Restaurant insurance – sale or return stock

Tuesday, May 25th, 2010

If you are looking for a restaurant insurance quote, or you have a valid insurance policy in place, you will have different sections of cover.

Your insurance cover will be based on what commercial insurance companies describe as a package policy. When they say package, this is because it is built up from different parts. All of these put together provide you with a package insurance policy that covers most of the things you need. Within this policy, you will have, or need, insurance for your stock. This will include all dry, wet and frozen stock.

Your wet stock may be on a sale or return basis, particularly where there are “new” drinks promotions ongoing. In these cases, it is still your responsibility to insure the stock, unless you have a specific written agreement from the suppliers that they are responsible, at all times, for the insurance cover. This does not usually happen, in most cases you need to ensure that your existing policy not only covers your own stock, but also the sale or return stock.

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Small business insurance – out of hours money cover.

Monday, May 24th, 2010

Most sensible and prudent owners or managers of smaller businesses, will have in place soe form of small business insurance. The choice is seemingly endless, but most policies will follow the same format and have very similarly titled sections of cover. For example, stock, machinery, plant and business building insurance. Employers, products and public liability and other smaller covers such as business interruption, money and legal expenses.

You do need to be careful to look at exactly what is covered and what is no. You may not think that you can have different cover, but nearly every insurer will offer different limits and have different terms and conditions.

One of the main differences is the out of hours money cover. A lot of businesses, particularly over a weekend will not have time to take their cash to a bank night safe and will have to leave this on the premises overnight.

Cash is of course king to not only the business but also to thieves. A lot of policies will restrict cover to a low limit, such as £100 unless the money is kept in a locked safe. If you have cash in a safe limit, this can be for thousands and thousands of pounds. For limits in excess of two or three thousand, you may need to specify the type of safe and/or whether this is cover only if the safe is bolted into the floor or the wall.

You should always check with your business insurance broker and ask them to review you policy wording and cover with you.

Posted in business money insurance, small business insurance | No Comments »

Shop insurance – seasonal increase cover

Saturday, May 22nd, 2010

Now is not traditionally the time to be thinking about Christmas, but if you are on the hunt for a good quality shop insurance quote, you do need to consider seasonal increase cover for your stock.

As with all commercial insurance policies, you need to declare the correct amount of stock insurance. The sum insured on your policy, or quote, should be sufficient for you to replace the stock at cost price.

Your business interruption insurance cover will take care of the loss of profits. You only insure for what you can ordinarily replace the stock for, including VAT if you are registered.

But, you need to think beyond summer 2010 and consider what your stock levels are likely to be in the weeks leading up to Christmas. Most shops and retailers increase their stock as this is traditionally the time of year when they are busiest.

The majority of shop policies do include a free increase to their stock limit for a specified period prior to Christmas. These can vary from 10 to 30%. This can be a big difference if you lose all your stock due to a fire or a theft, if you are not insured for the correct amount then you could find that your claim is reduced accordingly.

As we always recommend, speak to a business insurance broker as they know, understand and have experience of dealing with businesses similar to yours.

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Buy to let buildings insurance – which claims should I declare?

Friday, May 21st, 2010

When looking for a buy to let building insurance quote, you now have a wealth of providers who are able to provide you with prices.

A few years ago, you could only go to a specialist commercial insurance company for this type of cover. However, as the buy to let market has increased (even taking into account the recession), there are simply more properties requiring insurance.

As a result, some of the more traditional “private home” only insurers are starting to move into this area. Increased competition is always good news for the consumer. It also helps us, the business insurance broker, as it increases the range of products that are available in the market place.

Even though we have this increased choice, the basics of the insurance cover remain unaltered. You need to declare certain information to a broker, intermediary or an insurers and based on that information, they decide whether they wish to offer you a quotation.

Should they decide to offer you with a quote, they will then need to price up the insurance cover and provide terms. One set of questions you will be asked and must answer, relates to your claims history. One factor affecting both the ability to offer cover and the price available is whether you have had a number of claims.

Be careful though, even though the buy to let property, or properties, may be your “business”, you are still obliged to declare all claims that you have had. This will include the claim you had three years ago for a pot of coffee spilt on a carpet or your spectacles that were lost. Any domestic claim needs to be declared, they will more than likely be discounted, but you must come clean. Insurers share information and you need to be aware that if you mis-declare, any future claims could be repudiated, quite rightly, by the insurers.

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Small business insurance – spreading the cost

Thursday, May 20th, 2010

May 2010 has seen some of the highest inflation figures in the past 15 years. This is a bit of a double whammy, as the real cost of the money in your pocket, or savings account, is going to decrease over time.

It is important therefore that you look around as much as possible to see what exactly you can do to save as much money as possible. This applies to both business and personal life. Everyone, apart from some overpaid civil servants and mad bankers, is still reeling from and feeling the effects of the credit crunch/recession.

Business owners have suffered enough over the past few years and they are still continuing to feel the pain as people have less and less money to spend. If you have a small business insurance policy then there are different options for you to reduce your overall annual insurance costs.

The main one is to speak to your business insurance broker to review your policy cover and if necessary, reduce some figures to save costs. Of course, you should bot reduce figures unless absolutely necessary and your broker will deal with this in a professional manner. If they feel you are reducing figures too far, they will let you know.

Another way to get a reduction in the overall costs, is to pay the premium in monthly instalments. This means that your cash flow is better, but watch out for the hidden costs of paying monthly.

You may visit one of the websites that offer promises to compare business insurance to give you the best deal. They may offer you a cheaper price, but potentially you could have less cover, higher excesses and the instalment charge could make it uneconomic.

Look out for the deals that offer interest free instalments. Whilst your bank may charge a few pounds for every instalment, across the year, 0% is the best way forward.

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